LIKE PETER, CATHOLICS AND PROTESTANT DENY CHRIST THREE TIMES

Peter didn’t intend to deny his Lord, but actually we could compare his attitude to that of the Iscariot—sheer treason, even though for different motives and with very contrasting results and consequences.

In the second case the situation came to a no-return stage, and the physical, brutal, shocking death just served to anticipate the other death, eternal, inescapable, exemplary, of whom takes his or her treacherous infamy to final consequences.

Peter also betrayed the trust of his dear Master. He denied Him thinking in his own interest and safety. What a big mistake! Happily, he found the way back to full fellowship with the Savior through sincere repentance.

In both Catholic and Protestant fields, Jesus and His teachings are also denied in three flagrant situations, three attitudes of the Lord that are interpreted by those religious people in ways that put Christ under difficult situations.

The first of these occurrences has to do with how Christ dealt with the Sabbath commandment. Several texts produced by both Catholic and Protestant instructors picture Jesus as an untrustworthy Being in view of His own statements. Yes, because the Master had stated in no unclear terms:

“Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. I tell you the truth, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven”. (Mat. 5:17-19).

And He said more: “. . . I have obeyed my Father's commands and remain in his love” (John 15:10).

First Denial

The referred to instructors go over what Jesus says, especially in vs. 19 of Matthew chapter 5, and allege that He violated the Sabbath! Truly, in John 5:18 it is said that the Jews wanted to kill Him because “. . . not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God”. But is the evangelist issuing a statement in absolute terms or expressing the things those who accused Christ raised against Him?

Let’s consider some facts: if Christ were literally a Sabbath violator, He not only would have been inconsistent, but would reveal Himself as a sinner, for “sin is the transgression of the law” (1 John 3:4). Since the Sabbath commandment belonged to God’s law still in force, He couldn’t have neglected it “and thus teach men” without becoming Himself a sinner. Consequently, Jesus Himself would have to be considered “the least in the kingdom of God”, if we are to take seriously His own words in Matthew 5:19.

On the light of that text, if Christ really violated the Sabbath of God’s law, He would have been a hypocrite, because He recommends to His hearers not only to respect “the least” the commandments, (and the Sabbath was on of the main commandments of God’s law), while He wouldn’t follow His own instructions!

And, besides, He would have been a liar, telling the people that He kept His “Father’s commandments”. Thus, He ran a great risk when He addressed the challenge we read about in John 8:46: “Can any of you prove me guilty of sin?” If He were a Sabbath breaker, any of His hearers soon would raise his hand and say: “That is easy: Thou art a Sabbath violator”.

But, doesn’t the text of John 5:18 bring the clear information that He violated the Sabbath? Yes, John expresses two common accusations against the Christ:

a) that He violated the Sabbath;

b) that He made Himself equal to God illegitimately.

However, He could declare Himself equal to God legitimately, but was accused of doing it illegitimately. Thus, what John records is the tenor of the main accusations with which they labeled Him.

It’s really remarkable how some Catholic and Protestant Christians take so easily the side of Christ’s accusers in His disputes with the Jewish leadership regarding the Sabbath question. I have already said and reiterate now that I fully recognize the right of those who take that stand. At the same time I declare that on my part I prefer to stand by Jesus Christ!

The entire problem is very simple to resolve: one has just to understand the tenor of Christ’s debates with the Jewish leadership was as to IF they should keep the Sabbath, nor WHEN they should keep the Sabbath, but HOW to keep the “Lord’s day” in its due spirit. They not only corrupted the meaning of that commandment, but also the 5th of the Decalogue and the tithe practice, as we will see later on.

With this difficulty overcome in the understanding of a point, would we have the Catholic and Protestant Peter in abundant tears, repenting of his dare in insinuating a sin of this type to the “Lord of the Sabbath” Himself? He declared that, not because He had the right to do anything He wanted with the Sabbath (as certain instructors in the Catholic and Protestant fields sometimes interpret), but because He had authority to point to the distortions of the Jewish leaders regarding God’s commandments. After all, such leaders were often asking Him, “with what authority you do this?” Thus, they not only corrupted the meaning of the Sabbath commandment, as did the same with the 5th (see Mark 7:9-12).

They also were not faithful in the fulfillment of the tithing principle, rather they lost sight of its true character (Matthew 23:23). That is why Christ told them: “ . . . Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down. And you do many things like that”. (Mar. 7:13).

We could say that in the same way that Christ had the authority to expel the moneychangers from the Temple, He expelled from the Sabbath the legal excesses and distortion to the commandment that the Jewish leaders had imposed on the commandment, thus transforming it into a heavy burden to the people. He did that because He was zealous for God’s things.

Second Denial

Another treason to Christ on the part of Catholics and Protestant has to do with the incorrect understanding of the Savior’s words in Mark 7:1-23—the episode of His addressing the Pharisees when they criticized His disciples for not following certain purifying rites required by their traditions before the meals.

Christ’s words “nothing that enters the man from the outside can make him 'unclean'. . .” are understood as a statement of freedom from the dietary laws. There are, however, four difficulties for such a reasoning:


1 – If Jesus were “purifying” supposedly unclean meats in that meal, His act would have been of no use because that was a Jewish meal, when no unclean foods would be served.

2 – Christ would have been abolishing the food restrictions AHEAD OF TIME, for the dietary rules were not abolished on the cross?

3 – Christ would be teaching something contrary to the divine law “still” in force, for which He Himself would be considered “the least in the kingdom of heaven” on the light of His words in Matthew 5:19.

4 – Christ says that what they were requiring had to do with their traditions, not with the divine law. And He even highlights that they made null what God had determined due to what His own accusers called “traditions of the elders”, not the divine commandments.

Besides, the notion that those laws were abolished when Christ died on the cross makes no sense because they were not ceremonial precepts and didn’t point to His atoning death. Some allege that they symbolized the separation between Jews and gentiles, but that is illogical because God wouldn’t maintain in His law an aspect of negative human sentiments--racial prejudice and xenophobia--since it is said that God is “no respecter of persons”. It would also mean to change the focus from Christ and His redemptive role to sinful man, in a supposed symbolism of these legal rules.

Anyway, the fact is that Peter, much time after the cross, indicated that he hadn’t learned either with Jesus or his apostolic companions the “total freedom” from the law of food restriction in the sheet vision (Acts 10). He initially didn’t understand the vision (vs. 17), and when he understood it (vs. 28) he didn’t leave a clue that its meaning had the least to do with a supposedly freedom to eat it all. The vision just taught him not to consider the non-Jews as common or unclean (see also 11:17ff). He refers indirectly to the episode in his speech during the Jerusalem council, and speaks of “purification”, but not of unclean meats, rather that of the gentiles’ hearts (Acts 15:7-9).

But, a death blow on the “eat-it-all” freedom notion regarding the dietary laws in the New Testament we find in Hebrews 8:6-10, where we are informed of the change from the Old to the New Covenant, when God writes His laws in the hearts and minds of those who accept the terms of this New Covenant [New Testament]. It is never said that in this event God excludes these dietary laws!

Besides, John in the Revelation, written by the end of the first century of the Christian Church, speaks in Rev. 18:2: “With a mighty voice he shouted: "Fallen! Fallen is Babylon the Great! She has become a home for demons and a haunt for every evil spirit, a haunt for every unclean and detestable bird”.

If God had cancelled wholly all the limitation regarding the food rules, how could the Apostle now refer to “unclean fowl”? That is an additional difficulty for which those who advocate the “total freedom” regarding the dietary laws have no solution.

Third Denial

Finally, the third way by which both Protestant and Catholics deny Christ is when they interpret mistakenly His dialog with the supposed soul of Moses on the Transfiguration Mountain. Through that they again place the Savior in a very complicated situation. By the way, God Himself is in a difficult position in another interpretation, for the members of the Divinity are virtually pictured as following the bad example of the dictators of all times, who put themselves above the law. “L'État c’est moi” [The State am I], said one of the French sovereigns of past eras.

They picture God sending a message to the king of Israel, Saul, who had already been rejected, through a witch, in the episode of the visit of such king to the En-dor woman (1 Sam. 16:14; 28:6).

If God established clearly the order that His people never resorted to prognosticators, witch and sorcerers, NOR WHO CONSULTS THE DEAD (Deut. 18:9-10), and even decreed that those who practiced such things should be punished with death (Lev. 24:27), how would He Himself trample His own orders, and Christ to do exactly that which had been prohibited, promoting practically a spiritist séance on the mountain, communicating Himself with Moses’ “soul”, at the same time dealing with Elijah in resurrected body? Not to mention of the terrible example He would be leaving to His disciples. . .

But for certain religious people, Christ used to not take seriously God’s law, anyway, as we have already seen in the two first denials. Then, it wouldn’t make difference to violate again the law, in the episode of the Mount of Transfiguration.

What happens in that occasion, however, is a dialog between Christ, the resurrected Moses and the Elijah who had been taken in life to heaven.

That Moses had resurrected is implied in the cosmic battle between Michael and Satan concerning Moses’ body (Judah 9), and through the words of Paul that “death reigned from the time of Adam to the time of Moses” (Rom. 5:14). Satan certainly would have no interest in fighting for a cadaver! His struggle had to do with the resurrected body of Moses because up to that point he had maintained absolute power on death (Heb. 2:14). With Moses’ resurrection, the first challenge to his “the power of death” had emerged, and Satan wouldn’t accept it at all, thus struggled fiercely to maintain the Bible patriarch a prisoner of his kingdom of darkness.

The apostle Paul made it very clear that victory on death occurs only through the final resurrection, not by the possession of an immortal soul that survives the body’s death (1 Cor. 15:53-55).

Now we have to see if the reality’s rooster CROWING, exposed in the Bible text regarding these questions, will lead the “Peter” or Protestantism and Catholicism to a perception of their error and to genuine repentance and dedication to the cause of truth.

Jesus had an interview, recorded in John chapter 21, with the repentant and, certainly, ashamed Peter after the Resurrection. He intended to transmit to His beloved disciple the guarantee of His love and forgiveness in the face of his sincere repentance, but at the same time He recommended him, as many times as he had betrayed his Master: “Take care of my sheep”.

The pasture to where a dedicated shepherd will lead his sheep should be the most nutritious and attractive possible so that may grow healthy and vigorous.

The triple error of the negligence in the observance of the divine laws regarding the Sabbath and the dietary rules, as well as the teaching of immortality of the soul, originated in paganism, derived from the first satanic lie on this planet--“You will not surely die” (Gen. 3:4)—should be abandoned. Otherwise, this triple denial of the Master will not identify absolutely with Peter’s temporary problem, rather with the Iscariot treason, which was definitive and fatal.

May God’s light shine upon those who still deny the Master in these three regrettable errors, as is the case with the large majority of both Protestants and Catholics. – Written by Prof. Azenilto G. Brito.

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